U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,599,288 and 5,857,988 disclose knee braces using cross-connected cables to stabilize the knee and its ligaments and keep them aligned in patients with knee injuries. Because of the bilateral nature of the cross-connected cable design which distributed the stabilizing forces essentially evenly on both sides of the knee, these braces were, however, not effective in treating unicompartmental osteoarthritis pain or correcting stance abnormalities such as knock-kneed (valgus) or bowlegged (varus) stances of the otherwise healthy legs of children and adolescents, or in treating patients with medial or lateral unicompartmental osteoarthritis.
Currently available braces designed to correct such problems are heavy, expensive and awkward. It would therefore be desirable to be able to use the light, inexpensive bracing technology of the above-mentioned patents for this purpose.